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Academic Journal
A STUDY ON THE ABILITY OF THE SECOND YEAR STUDENTS OF SMA AN-NAAS PEKANBARU IN WRITING
EXPLANATION TEXT
MARTINA
Student of English Language Education Department Faculty of Teacher’s Training and Education
Riau University
Abstract
The purpose of this research is to know how good is the ability of the second year students of SMA An-Naas Pekanbaru in writing explanation text. The subjects were 20 students from XI science class at SMA An-Naas Pekanbaru. The researcher used the writing test as an instrument in collecting the data. The students’ score were analyzed by three raters. The aspects which were evaluated were; grammar, vocabulary, mechanic, fluency and organization. The results showed that the most difficult aspect of writing for students is grammar, where the average score was 69.5. Then, the students’ highest score was in the aspect of organization, with the average score of 81.9. Based on the assessment of each aspect of writing, the students who got 80-100 are 3 students(15%), it belongs to good to excellent level. Then, the students who got 60-79 are 17 students (85%) which belongs to average to good level. Finally, the researcher gets the conclusion that the percentage of students’ ability in writing explanation text is in the average to good level.
Keyword: descriptive research, Study on the ability, writing.
INTRODUCTION
Writing is as a way of communicating and saying things in a written form for a particular audience, and in particular occasion.” When students want to write something, they should have a lot of information the ideas, and thought in their mind. Students will be able to express the ideas into sentence, paragraph, and an essay.
The purpose of writing is to expression of ideas, to conveying of a massage to the reader. Writing as a subject, make the students to be active rather than passive receivers of information. Because, when we write, we train our mind, our energy, and our knowledge and form them into good writing that can be read by all people.
Martinez (1986:37) says that writing is a process with a purpose series of action undertaken with a specific objective in mind. In literature or imagine writing, the purpose may be to entertain, criticize, or draw clear pictures of our realities, and the product of poem, a story or play. The process of learning to write is largely to think more clearly. There are twelve genre taught in senior high school. Explanation text is factual text types used to explain how and why things happen. It is often used in the fields of science and technology (Butt et al:2001).
According to Brown (1981: 4), the purpose of writing helps to control many of choices made during the process of composition-organizational pattern, method of development, sentence structure and word choice. Based on the explanation above, it can be concluded that writing is a process of expressing ideas in written form. In writing there are some skills that should be mastered to make a good composition.
There are many aspects that students need to understand of purpose in an explanation text. Grace (2007:84) says that explanation text tells how and why this occurs of scientific and technical field. Then, the students need to know of generic structure. The students have to know of language features that are used of the text, such as the tenses, conjunction, verb, passive voice, etc.
Furthermore, some aspects involve in writing explanation text that should be concerned by the writer, there are grammar, vocabulary, mechanics fluency and organization and language features uses in explanation text in order to create a good explanation text. So that, base on the background above, the writer regard that in conducting a research. Therefore, the writer has interested in carrying the research entitled “A Study On The Ability Of Second Year Students Of SMA AN-NAAS Pekanbaru in writing explanation text.
METHODOLOGY
This is a descriptive research. The typical of descriptive studies are concerned with the assessment of attitudes, opinion, preferences, practices, and procedures. The population and this research is the second year students of SMA An-Naas Pekanbaru in academic year 2012. In this case, the writer used cluster sample. According to (Gay and Peter Airisian:1990),cluster sample is randomly selects group. So that, the writer choose the class that has been selected become sample of this research by using lottery.
The technique of collecting the data plays an important role in conducting a research. In getting the data, the writer uses the writing test as an instrument in order to know students’ ability in writing explanation text. The research instrument used in collecting the data for this research is in form of written test.
In this case, the test used is writing explanation text by using procedure as the following:
1. The students were given test to write explanation text.
2. The students were asked to write explanation text, at least three paragraphs that over the topic in 90 minutes. The writer remained them to pay attention to the structure of an explanation text.
3. Finally, after their writing tasks were collected, their writing were evaluated by three rater.
In scoring the students composition position, the writer uses the scoring which found in Arthur Hughes (1986:93). Writing involves many aspects that should be concerned by the writer. Hughes (1986:91-93) say there are five aspects of making a good writing which are; grammar, vocabulary, mechanic, fluency, organization.
To find out the student’s range and classification, the writer uses the table follows:
Table 1.Range Scores and Classification
Score Classification
80 – 100 Good to excellent
60 -79 Average to good
50 – 59 Poor to average
00 – 49 Poor
( Harris David, 1974:134 )
RESULT AND DISCUSSION
After getting the score of the students from the raters, the writer classified the students’ scores based on each component of writing as shown in the following table:
Table 1
The Students’ Score for Each Aspect of Writing The
Score
The Aspect of Writing Evaluated
Grammar Vocabulary Mechanic Fluency Organization
F % F % F % F % F %
80-100 23 115
%
33 165
%
21 105
%
33 165% 48 240
% 60-79 25 125
%
22 110
%
31 155
%
16 80% 10 50%
50-59 10 50% 5 25% 8 40% 9 45% 2 10%
0-49 2 10% 0 0% 0 0% 2 10% 0 0%
Total 60 300 60 300 60 300 60 300 60 300
There are 20 students who took the writing test. The students’ score has been analyzed by three raters. The students who got the highest score is organization aspect. Then, the students who got the lowest score is grammar aspect. It can be shown in the following graph:
Grammar Vocabulary Mechanic Fluency Organization 23
33
21
33
48
25 22
31
16
10 10
5 8 9
2
2 0 0 2
0
The Students' Score for Each Aspect of Writing
80-100 60-79 50-59 0-49
Table 2.The total score for each aspect of writing
Based on table above, on the grammar aspect, the average score is 69.5.
On the vocabulary aspect, the average score is 75.2. And then, on the mechanic aspect, the average score is 69.7. On the fluency aspect, the average score is 72.7.
On the organization aspect, the average score is 81.9.Therefore, we can see that the aspect of writing that is the most difficult for students are on grammar aspect.
It is proven by the average score is 69.5 which is the lowest one. Then, the students who got the highest score is organization aspect, with the average score is 81.9. It can be show in the following graph:
Grammar Vocabulary Mechanic Fluency Organization 23
33
21
33
48
25 22
31
16
10 10
5 8 9
2
2 0 0 2
0
The Students' Score for Each Aspect of Writing
80-100 60-79 50-59 0-49
The Aspect of Writing The average score Classification
Grammar 69.5 Average to good
Vocabulary 75.2 Average to good
Mechanic 69.7 Average to good
Fluency 72.7 Average to good
Organization 81.9 Good to excellent
Table 2.The total score for each aspect of writing
Table 3.The Percentage of Students’ Ability in Writing
The Score Frekuensi %
80-100 3 15%
60-79 17 85%
50-59 0 0%
0-49 0 0%
Total 20 100%
The table above shows the percentage of the students’ ability in writing test. The students who got the level 80-100 are 3 students(15%), it is belong good excellent. And then, the students who got the level 60-79 are 17 students (85%), it is average to good. Based on the explanation above, the writer get the conclusion,the percentage of students’ ability in writing explanation text is average to good. It can be shown in the following graph:
Grammar Vocabulary Mechanic Fluency Organization 69.5
75.2
69.7
72.7
81.9
The Total Score for Each Aspect of Writing
80-100 60-79 50-59 0-49
3
17
0 0
The Percentage of Students' Ability in Writing
Table 4.The Students’ Score and Their Categories in Writing Explanation Text
The total score Average Ability level
221.57 73.85 Average to good
From the table above, the students’ score and ability level in writng explanation text. In the table, it shown that the average score is 73.85 which is average to good.
After taking the data and analyzing it, the writer found that the students’
ability in writing explanation text is average to good. The average score is 73.85.
It means that the students have good ability in writing explanation text.
Furthermore, from the five aspects of writing evaluated the writer found that the highest mean score obtained by the students in writing a explanation text is on organization aspect which is 81.9. It means that they have good ability in organization aspect. Although, they still make some errors and sometimes the reader needs re-reading for full comprehension. After that, the students who got the lowest average score is 69 in grammar aspect. Based on students’ writing of an explanation text, the students score in writing is average to good.
CONCLUSION
The writer made this research is to know the students’ ability in writing explanation text, and to find out the writing aspect of explanation text which is the most difficult and the easiest for the students. Based on the data analysis, the researcher gets the conclusion:
The ability of the second year students of SMA An-Naas Pekanbaru in writing explanation text is average to good (73.85).
And then, the average score of each aspect of writing ; grammar aspect is 69.5, vocabulary aspect is 75.2, mechanic aspect is 69.7, and also the organization aspect is 81.9.
The aspect of writing that is the most difficult of the students is grammar aspect. Where the students got score 69.5, which is the lowest score.
the highest score of the writing aspect is organization, which is 81.9 score.
the lowest score in writing aspect is grammar, it is 69.5.
Based on the percentage of students’ ability in writing, the students who got score 80-100 are 3 students, that is excellent. And then, the students who got score 60-79 are 17 students, that is average to good.
SUGGESTION
Based on the research finding, the ability of the second year students of SMA AN-NAAS Pekanbaru in writing explanation text is average to good. The students not reach yet to high score of the le
vel good to excellent. In this time, the writer would like to give some suggestions as follows:
The students have to pay more attention to develop their ability in grammar aspect which is the lowest score in writing explanation text.
The students should motivate themselves in writing and be active in the class.
They also have to keep practicing in writing in order to produce a good writing.
The teacher needs to encourage and motivate the students to practice their skill in writing explanation text.
Finally, the writer expects for all the participants, the conclusions and suggestion in this research will be useful for the reader, especially teacher and students of the second year students of SMA AN-NAAS Pekanbaru in writing explanation text.
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